Dillards, Twin Peaks Mall owners don't announce agreement

Longmont could use eminent domain to speed up redevelopment

LONGMONT -- On the last scheduled day of negotiations between Dillard's and the owners of the Twin Peaks Mall, no contract between the two was announced.

Mall owner NewMark Merrill Mountain States had hoped to reach an agreement by Monday, clearing the path for the $80 million redevelopment of Twin Peaks.

"I don't have anything to say today," said Brad Power, Longmont's economic development director. The city has been working with both sides as the negotiations go on.

A deal with Dillard's is essential since the department store owns its own building and land, rather than leasing them from the mall.

Dillard s, pictured here in October, and the owners of the Twin Peaks Mall did not announce on Monday if they had agreed on a new contract.
(
Greg Lindstrom
)

Should discussions fall through, the Longmont City Council will discuss on April 9 whether to use eminent domain, essentially dictating a price at which the Dillard's property will be purchased. The city has considered that a last resort, but not an unthinkable one.

In February, a timeline was set for talks with NewMark Merrill, Dillard's, and with Regal Entertainment Group, which holds a lease giving it the exclusive right to operate a movie theater on the site. On March 19, the city announced that NewMark and Regal had reached an agreement that would let the company operate a 12-screen theater at the mall.

Earlier this year, Allen Ginsborg of NewMark Merrill Mountain States said that failure to reach an agreement with Dillard's by April 1 could push the mall's redevelopment back a year. The delay could slow financing, he said, and lose an opportunity to recruit more tenants at the May meeting of the International Council of Shopping Centers.

If the mall owner meets certain benchmarks-- securing the movie theater was one -- the city will put $27.5 million into the project, to be repaid by the additional sales and property tax generated by the new mall and by a levy the mall will place on itself.

If the project goes ahead on schedule, demolition is expected to begin by fall, with most of the work to be finished in time for the 2014 holiday shopping season.

Neither Dillard's nor NewMark Merrill could be reached for comment on Monday.

In June 2010, the Boulder County Assessor's Office valued the Dillard's property at $3,798,600. A fresh valuation is due to be sent to the property owners at the end of this month.

Assessor Jerry Roberts said he couldn't comment on the new valuation until after it had been sent out. And of course, that's no guarantee of what either Dillard's would ask or NewMark Merrill would pay in a sale.

"We're going to be very interested in what they end up selling it for -- as (interested) as everybody else, as far as that goes," Roberts said.

In the market, the value of the Twin Peaks Mall as a whole has declined in recent years; its prior owner, Panattoni Development Co., paid $33.6 million for the mall in 2007, but five years later, NewMark Merrill picked it up for only $8.5 million.

"There's been a general decline to that whole mall over a period of years, and our values reflect that," Roberts said.

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